


On and On and On

by loveclouds



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Happy Ending, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-21
Updated: 2014-09-21
Packaged: 2018-02-18 06:50:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2339120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loveclouds/pseuds/loveclouds
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wouldn't it be awful to be in love with Erwin Smith?</p>
            </blockquote>





	On and On and On

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Español available: [Una y otra y otra vez](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2358116) by [Petula_Petunia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Petula_Petunia/pseuds/Petula_Petunia)



One time, Erwin takes Levi out to a day market. They don’t make a lot of trips out just for recreation but sometimes they do because people need that once in a while, they can’t coop up for that long and think about death and maiming with such regularity, so Levi just rolls his eyes when Erwin proposes the idea and signals his agreement by not calling Erwin a complete dumbass.

That night, lost in his closet of uniforms and finely pressed shirts, Levi pretends he is not excited, not agonizing over what to wear, and most certainly not looking forward to a day alone with Erwin. 

Why would he? He knows what love is, he’s seen it on people’s faces and he and Erwin are _not_ like that, and he knows infatuation, he’s seen that on just about everybody’s faces, and he knows childish affections, he was young enough to feel that way once. This is none of that; he respects himself too much for that. 

Except, really, when Erwin greets him bright and early at his door, some strange propriety about picking him up and walking with him the entire way, Levi has nothing to say about any of it. 

They head to the day market where everyone is jovial and the constant threat of death can subside into the shadows for a while. Erwin is dressed down in dark trousers and a soft looking sweater and it’s probably the most casual Levi has seen him in a handful of years. 

When was the last time Erwin took any time off? Levi himself was forced to go on holiday a few months back at Erwin’s command and Levi had sulked about it for an entire morning before finding some extracurricular amusement by scrubbing down the entirety of Erwin’s office. While Erwin had shot him particular looks throughout, he also hadn’t complained, so it was sort of like being at work except Levi gave no shits about saluting anyone who walked through the door for a meeting. They should feel so lucky to be greeted by the sight of him on hands and knees with three buckets of soapy water to play with. 

“Look,” Erwin says, pointing to a small game stall. There are kids staring around it in wonder at all the small toys to be won and Levi frowns very hard. “Why don’t we go try?”

“I knew that was coming,” Levi mutters under his breath, just loud enough to be heard, but Erwin’s laughing because Levi’s the one leading the way. 

It’s rigged, obviously, but Levi is a warrior before he’s anything else. Cut him open and he’d bleed fire and steel. His competitive edge is so ramped that the kids take to cowering behind Erwin, who has the sunniest smile to match his sunny hair, who has the kindest blue eyes, who is anything but a commander when he isn’t forced to be. Levi gives him a sidelong glance before getting back to it.

It takes a while but Levi slowly amasses enough toys to close the stall early. He doesn’t smile when he hands the toys out to the kids and watches them run off laughing, but he does feel something warm pool at the pit of his stomach because he remembers Isabel most in moments like this. He hands the last toy to Erwin, a small rabbit toy with floppy ears, so small that it gets completely dwarfed in Erwin’s hand. 

“Thank you, Levi,” Erwin says. Levi turns and walks away. He doesn’t want to admit to anyone how the warmth in his stomach has blossomed like fireworks through his chest. 

\---

The thing is, Levi doesn’t really understand love all that much. He’s never had much of it in his life and the closest feeling to it has always burned him in the end. Isabel, Farlan, his squad, everyone he’s ever cared about—well, what’s the point in trying anymore?

Levi is sure that he will never be able to keep anyone. Not because the feelings aren’t there, but because they are and he’ll be happy for a while, and he knows he’s not allowed happiness, so it’s easier just not to fall into the lie. Security is transitory—that’s why it feels so precious. 

\---

One time, a long time ago, Levi lived in the dark. He didn’t mind it but he did hate it on principle, and he despised everyone who could walk so freely above him every day. 

Then, in the middle of a completely not extraordinary day, Erwin brought him the sun. And then it was extraordinary, because Levi suddenly had light.

He hasn’t looked back. While he may not subscribe to all of Erwin’s ideals, he knows with certainty that walking with Erwin will only be on a path forward, and for him, that is enough.

\---

Levi can recall the exact moment something happens between him and Erwin. They’re in Erwin’s office as they tend to be and it’s late at night as it tends to be but that night, it’s storming out, Erwin has a teetering pile of bullshit on his desk, and Levi’s run out of tea to drink. He walks around Erwin’s desk to maybe fix his hair, he’s somehow taken to doing that when no one’s looking, but Erwin catches his hand, and that’s a first. 

Levi’s expression doesn’t change but Erwin feels every iota of stiffness in his body. Fight or flight, that’s all warriors have. 

“Do you think people like us deserve to love anyone?” Erwin asks. It must be a joke, it’s not anything that someone like Erwin would ask, but Levi can only see seriousness in Erwin’s face. 

Levi takes a shallow breath and shifts, uncomfortable. Erwin’s hand is hot around his own, halfway to touching Erwin’s face, now suspended in nowhere. “I don’t think people like us know how to love anyone,” he says carefully.

Erwin assesses this answer for so long that Levi almost twists away, but he doesn’t. Erwin just nods once and lets him go, picks up his pen to continue scrawling signatures to bullshit memos, and Levi is incredibly dissatisfied with that reaction. He doesn’t know why.

It’s strange. He knows Erwin best, he knows that, but he also doesn’t know _why_ when it comes to _anything_ about him. 

Scowling, he presses his palm flat on the memo and drags it away, not caring that Erwin’s signature gets dragged into a long, dark line halfway down the page. He doesn’t need Erwin to say anything; Levi is a man of action, and he kisses Erwin first, no doubt in any of it. 

He’ll think about that a lot later. He kissed Erwin first, but Erwin was the first to hold him like he was precious, like he really mattered. Levi doesn’t like to think about it. Maybe because deep down, he knows that to Erwin, that’s what he is. 

\---

One time, they fuck like the sun isn’t going to rise again. It’s been a long time since Levi’s slept with anybody, let alone go at it all night, but Erwin’s hands and mouth are everywhere and Levi doesn’t know where he is by the end of it. Isn’t that the way it’s supposed to be? Wrapped up in the moment, in temporary relief from everything, held by someone warm and filled to the brim with passion, even if it isn’t permanent. 

Except, every time after that is different. 

Levi hates to call it sweetness, but he wakes unnaturally early one morning and actually bothers to look around Erwin’s private bedroom. He notices for the first time that there’s a small rabbit toy sitting on Erwin’s bookshelf. Maybe it doesn’t mean anything, except the part where it does because it’s tucked right next to Erwin’s favorite book, some fantasy-history about the ocean and the strange creatures that maybe live in it. It’s disturbing enough that Erwin has the audacity to display a pink children’s toy in his room without shame, but even more so that Levi knows every book on Erwin’s bookshelf, and he knows in what order Erwin’s arranged them by favorites. 

He doesn’t take stock of the decorating in here often but he does know everything about Erwin front and back, even if he doesn’t understand him. It’s like appreciating how other people can fall in love and get married and stay happy despite fear and fighting, but never understanding how they manage to do so. 

Levi doesn’t fuss with details. He doesn’t need to understand Erwin as long as he still gets to be the one who knows him best.

\---

What’s that thing that people say? 

You fall in love slowly, and then all at once?

\---

Wouldn’t it be awful to be in love with Erwin Smith? He’s a dead man, he’s just living the seconds until the seconds run out, because somewhere out there, there’s an early death waiting. It might be between a titan’s teeth, it might be at the hands of traitorous and useless humans, but he’s a doomed man, everyone knows it. That’s how this life goes—there’s no warmth to be found in it. There’s no glory in death, no silver lining; it’s just death, and loving it is like committing suicide from the inside out. 

What is there to fill a person with when all the love is taken out?

\---

One time, Levi wakes up late on a sunny Sunday morning, lost in Erwin’s sheets. Erwin was there a little while ago but he isn’t anymore; when Levi quietly calls Erwin’s name, there is no reply, so he knows he must’ve been alone now for a while. 

It’s such a cliché to be in this position, but Levi’s body is pleasurably sore and for once, he isn’t in a bad mood. He’s got nowhere to be today so he buries his face in Erwin’s pillow and breathes, letting it remind him of the night before. Erwin hadn’t said much to him, just smiled when Levi brought him tea and a biscuit in the fine china set that Levi keeps in private reserve. He hadn’t stopped smiling all night, and he even laughed a few times, and though Levi doesn’t like to admit it, he really likes that he can make Erwin laugh. 

Whatever it is that they’ve been doing, it’s been going on for a long time now. Levi can hardly stand the gentleness in which Erwin touches him but he doesn’t lie to himself about how much he arches into every touch, strains to hear every sigh in his ear, cries out in answer to every whisper of his name. 

When had that started? Levi can’t remember, but he also can’t remember a time when Erwin hadn’t called for him when they had sex. 

It’s very strange, how it’s all so much and all at once, and he can’t remember when it started.

\---

“Erwin, I’ve brought you tea,” Levi says, walking into Erwin’s room without knocking, just as he always does. 

He’s all the way to Erwin’s bed before he stops, eyes sharp as he looks to Erwin’s face. It must’ve been a hard day—Erwin is quiet, there’s a strain to his smile, and Levi doesn’t believe it for a second when Erwin takes his cup of tea with a smile. 

“What?” Levi asks, grouchy and mean because he doesn’t know how to show concern the proper way.

Erwin looks at him, smiles that fake smile again. “Do you think someone like me deserves to love anyone?” he asks. 

Levi remembers an echo of this question from a long, long time ago, but it’s somehow more dangerous now. He’s smart enough to know that. 

“Depends,” he answers, leaving to set the tea on Erwin’s writing desk, but they both know it’s Levi’s way of putting space between them. “Who are you in love with?” If there was a line, it would be drawn in thick black ink, at least a foot wide, right across the floor between them.

“Levi,” Erwin says, sounding so tired. 

“You don’t have that kind of luxury,” Levi interrupts, staring hard at the wall in front of him, hands fussing with teacups, “neither of us do.”

Erwin is quiet. Levi doesn’t turn around because he doesn’t want to see Erwin’s face. He’ll pretend the next day that he didn’t mean anything cruel by it, that he wasn’t trying to push Erwin away, but right now, he can’t face the expression Erwin must be wearing. After all this time, he knows Erwin too well to not know what his words cause, even if he doesn’t understand how he can have such an effect on someone as resilient as Erwin Smith.

Though he had intended to stay the night, he doesn’t, not knowing how he could stand to be touched by Erwin and pretend he didn’t say anything so hard to him. There’s too much softness to all of this—he wishes it could just be simple, that they could just fuck and get it out of their systems, the end. 

\---

For a week after that night, Erwin keeps his distance. They interact as much as they always did but there’s a guardedness to him, he looks far away when their eyes meet, and by the end of that week, there’s so much frustration welled up in Levi’s gut that he feels like throwing up. 

Part of him is also just scared. As disgusting as he feels about it, he’s scared that things are totally different, that Erwin no longer trusts him the most. 

Erwin’s not that kind of guy; unsurprisingly, he’s back to being sweet eventually, smiling at Levi when they’re in private in that way of his, like all the sunshine has collected in one place for Levi to feel. Levi feels stupid for having had worried about something so trivial, because it’s not like they even had a fight or anything, but he does make sure to let his touches linger a little longer, he lies with him a bit closer, and he grips Erwin a little tighter each time Erwin whispers his name in his ear, _Levi, Levi, Levi._

“Erwin,” he says one night, so lost in Erwin’s arms that he doesn’t know where his hands are anymore, “I don’t think it’s a bad thing if you love someone.”

Erwin shifts just a bit, trailing his fingertips down Levi’s nape to the first knob of his spine, over and over again, stroking him. Gooseflesh breaks out across Levi’s skin. 

“Oy, I’m not a pet.” There’s an embarrassing amount of contentment in his voice.

“I think, maybe, in the end,” Erwin says slowly, “you can’t make people fight for anything else.”

Levi considers this. “Some people are driven by anger.”

“Maybe…but I think that’s just a shade of the same thing.”

Levi grows uncomfortable with the direction this conversation is taking again, and that direction is definitely way too close to home. He doesn’t want to think about it. He doesn’t want to be vulnerable to anything, much less a dead man walking. If they don’t talk about it, they can stay with what they have, and isn’t what they have right now fantastic just the way it is? Levi’s never had anything so easy and warm without repercussions before—why does Erwin want to change that?

“The next expedition’s date has been decided,” Erwin says, pulling Levi suffocating tight. “I expect you to stay off your bad leg and recover while we’re gone.”

“You’re stupid to go without me,” Levi says, relieved for the change in topic, but also more nervous because he suspects Erwin’s still talking about the same thing at its core. He gently kicks Erwin in the side with his bad leg for good measure. “Don’t get eaten, old fart.”

It has less bite when he’s got his eyes closed and face buried in Erwin’s chest. 

Erwin’s silent for such a long time that Levi thinks he might’ve fallen asleep. “Erwin?” he asks.

“Yes?” Erwin replies immediately, and Levi blushes a little. He wasn’t really thinking about saying anything.

“I’m…serious about not getting eaten. You’re a lot more…useless without me.”

Well, it didn’t come out perfect, but that’s probably the best Levi’s going to do as of tonight. As if he could ever tell Erwin to his face to come back alive, like he has any right to value one man’s life over all the soldiers who’ve died in battle next to him. Too selfish, too sentimental, too stupid. 

“I think you might not like what I’m about to say,” Erwin says quietly, and Levi holds his breath, “but if I don’t come back, I want you to use your best judgment going forward.”

Levi sets his jaw. “I can’t take over this piece of shit,” he says with all the venom he can manage, “I don’t know how to talk the way you do.”

“That’s not what I meant.” Erwin gently presses a kiss to the top of Levi’s head and it makes Levi want to scream. He doesn’t _understand._ “You’re not tied to this place, Levi. That’s all I mean.”

“You are so full of shit,” he says defensively. He doesn’t understand, and he’s scared all the time of Erwin’s words these days. 

“I know it’s always been your choice to stay, so I—”

“Shut the fuck up,” Levi hisses, his nails cutting crescents into Erwin’s back, “I’m going to beat the shit out of you when you come back. You better come back and take it like a man.”

Erwin sighs, long and defeated, but Levi is grateful he doesn’t push it any further. His heart is pounding in his ears, unsteady and hard, a headache forming between his eyes. 

_I’ll figure it out when he comes back. Just until he comes back._

\---

Is it more painful to leave someone?

Or to be left behind?

\---

One time, Levi lets Erwin go to war without him, and everything about his life changes again. 

Levi paces the grounds, restless and worried, though he only shows it through anger. It’s easiest for him and also easiest for everyone else to understand. With the air tasting like copper and more body parts coming back than actual bodies, no one’s in a mood for anything but anger. What do you get when you take all the love out of a person? Nothing. Just nothing.

The mission was a success, they all say, but no one’s smiling when they say it. It hadn’t gone well, for all its success. Their warriors are coming back straggling, fragmented and far from whole. 

Levi’s hands are cold and he can’t warm them up. He’s lost count how many times he’s scanned the hospital beds for Erwin but he isn’t there, and he isn’t in his office writing a debrief either, and he isn’t on the grounds, talking to the other recruits. 

All other possibilities are not being entertained in his head. Levi snarls at anyone who tries to approach him, stalking around like a caged animal.

He can’t stop thinking about it. _I know it’s always been your choice to stay, so I—_ So what, Erwin? So what? What was the rest of that fucking sentence? 

Levi’s nearly in a blind panic when another hour passes and there’s _nothing,_ so he finally talks to someone, a familiar face without a name. He hears the words fine, that Erwin had been seriously injured, that a titan had him in its teeth the last time anyone had seen him, that he was brave and wonderful and a leader to the last, and all the ways that he _was._

“Captain Levi?” she asks suddenly, concerned, “are you alright? Do you need to sit down?”

“Of course I’m alright,” he spits, finding himself breathing very hard, “what- what the fuck-”

She grabs his arm and he’ll have to beat the shit out of her for that later, but he lets her sit him down on the closest cot because the world is on a strange tilt suddenly. He can’t find his bearing. 

“I- I’ll go get you some water,” she says, and he can see in her face that kind of pity that people usually have when someone dies. She practically runs from him and Levi is glad for the privacy. He breathes, claws for air until he gets feeling back in his hands and feet. Shaking himself off, he walks outside, hoping Erwin will be there and tell him it’s some badly planned joke, but there’s no one. He turns his face to the cloudy sky and waits for rain.

\---

It’s another hour before anyone approaches him. Levi wonders what kind of face he’s making because everyone averts their eyes but he doesn’t think he really cares to find out. 

All he can focus on is how sore he is on the inside. It’s so deep that he knows he can’t reach it, but god it aches, so bad that it’s all he can do to stand there and breathe, and he wishes it would go away. 

“Captain,” Mikasa says, and Levi’s probably always minded Ackerman the least. “I…are you alright?”

“Ackerman,” he says, “do you know what it’s like to live in total darkness?”

She pauses before answering. Levi knows her entire history—maybe that’s why he minds her the least. “Yes, sir. I do.”

“So what would you do now, if all the light goes out of your life?”

She turns and looks at something, someone, but Levi doesn’t follow her gaze. “I guess…I would keep fighting in the dark.”

Levi closes his eyes and desperately tries to remember the last time he and Erwin kissed. Was it that night they didn’t sleep until dawn, saying nothing but spending every moment with each other? Was it after that, during a sleepy morning bath? Was it the day after, between sips of tea in the evening? Or after that, between Erwin’s meetings and Levi’s training, something hurried but still necessary, because they were already stuck in the need for them? Fuck, he can’t remember at all, not with certainty, because there were so many and he never started any with the intention of it being the last. 

“And what would you do, knowing that someone you cared about was going to die?”

He looks at her then, finding comfort in the resolve in her eyes. He misses that kind of conviction, that kind of youth.

“…I…would try to make every moment before then mean something.”

“Yes,” Levi says, thinking about Erwin’s smile, all that _brightness,_ “I think maybe that’s always been the right choice.”

“…Captain,” she says after a long moment, clearly a bit confused, “aren’t you going to see the Commander?”

She pretends not to see the way he braces himself, like someone’s just hit him in the face. “Did they bring his body back?”

“Body?” she asks, “no, they had to bring him to a better hospital inside Wall Sina because we don’t have the right tools—”

Later, people will ask her why Levi grabbed her and shook her like that, why he had yelled like that, why he had taken off running despite the obvious limp from his bad leg. The thing is, she does know why, she could see him making a choice right in front of her, but she doesn’t think it’s her business to tell anyone about it. 

In this life, you have to carry your passion in front. If you want the people who matter to understand it, you have to let them see.

\---

You don’t always miss the obvious thereness of another person. It isn’t anniversaries or attending things as a unit or even having someone to go to bed with. It’s the everyday, all the little things, the way someone’s so weaved into every facet of your life that extrication is like digging nails into your own flesh and tearing out tight stitches. Yes, those wounds heal given enough time, but they scar for life. 

That’s what Levi remembers as he runs. The frustrating warmth, the choking passion, the knowledge that he has a _home_ to go back to, because Erwin’s made room for just one more in his life in the shape of Levi. 

\---

Once upon a time, Erwin gave him the sun. 

“You stupid fucking piece of shit,” he whispers, every syllable shaking, so angry and horrified to see Erwin so wounded and small. He’s a great big tree of a man, sunshine for hair and clear days in his eyes, an unstoppable force of nature that only moves forward. Levi doesn’t know how to make sense of what’s missing, but he’s so relieved, so fucking relieved that there’s still so much there.

Levi bows his body around Erwin’s and stays with him. He’s angry enough to kill anyone who tries to make him leave, but no one does, and none of the nurses say anything even as they change Erwin’s bandages. After long enough, Levi takes over doing that, too, and tells them not to bother coming back in.

\---

Three days of recovery equals just under seventy hours of no sleeping. Levi eventually passes out right across Erwin’s knees and thinks he must be hallucinating when he jolts awake to fingers in his hair. 

“Good morning,” Erwin says, smiling at him like he isn’t missing an arm, like nothing’s happened at all, “you seem extremely tired. I kind of feel that way too.”

Levi straightens, swallowing around the sandpaper ball in his throat. “How bad is the pain?” he chokes out, seizing Erwin’s hand in his own, Erwin’s _only_ hand, now. 

“Doesn’t feel good,” Erwin says, which must mean it’s fucking excruciating. Levi files away another request for morphine. 

“You piece of shit,” Levi provides, crawling over shakily until he’s got his face buried in Erwin’s neck, “I hate you, you stupid piece of shit. You scared me.” He holds Erwin tight enough to suffocate him but Erwin just relaxes into it.

“I feel like I’ve been asleep for a long time,” Erwin murmurs in his ear, “it’s a beautiful day outside.”

“Yeah,” Levi whispers, not trusting his voice. He lets his eyes fill, his hands fisted tight in the back of Erwin’s shirt, just short of ripping it altogether. “It’s been a long time since the sun’s come out.”

\---

One time, Levi wakes tucked along Erwin’s side, so in love that he can’t breathe with it. He helps Erwin do up the buttons of his shirt, arranges his tie for him, kisses him for a long minute that might span three before they walk out the door together. Levi hasn’t been back to his own room in months because he’s finally smart enough to know where home is. He thinks he finally understands Erwin now but to be honest, he no longer gives a shit. 

One night, Erwin whispers the sweetest words against his lips, then actually looks a bit embarrassed about it, maybe even shy, and that makes Levi laugh. They are way too old to be acting like this. 

But, on nights when he’s feeling generous, he’ll whisper the words back, sometimes to tease, sometimes because he can’t contain how his heart feels too big for his chest, but most often because he wants Erwin to understand how he feels.

Then, it’s ten times, and then a hundred, and then Levi loses count, because it’s too hard to count happiness anyway.

**Author's Note:**

> Not even gonna lie I was so overwhelmed by eruri feels today I had to listen to style five's "future fish" on repeat to cope and almost got auditory diabetes (￣v￣)ﾉ


End file.
